Guide
Decision log template: how to record team decisions
A decision log is a running list of the decisions your team has made, with the reasoning behind each one. It's the cheapest way to stop re-arguing settled questions — if anyone actually keeps it up to date. Here's a template that's short enough that they will.
Updated October 1, 2026 · 5 min read · By the Align team
What a decision log is (and isn't)
A decision log records what was decided, when, by whom, and why. It is not meeting minutes (which record what was said) and not a task list (which records what has to be done). One decision, one entry, linked to the tasks and documents it produced.
Engineering teams often know this as Architecture Decision Records (ADRs). A decision log applies the same idea to every kind of decision: product scope, pricing, hiring, vendor choices, launch calls.
The fields worth tracking
| Field | What to write |
|---|---|
| ID | A short reference, e.g. DEC-042, so people can link to it. |
| Date | When it was decided. |
| Decision | One sentence, in the past tense: "We will ship v2 without SSO." |
| Context | The question and why it came up now. |
| Options considered | Including the ones you rejected, and why. |
| Reasoning | The two or three reasons that actually decided it. |
| Decided by / agreed by | The owner and everyone who explicitly agreed. Note dissent. |
| Status | Proposed, decided, superseded (link the newer decision), or reversed. |
| Revisit | A date or condition that would reopen it, if any. |
| Links | Docs, tickets, recordings, threads. |
Copy-paste decision log template
ID: DEC-[number] Date: [YYYY-MM-DD] Decision: [One sentence, past tense] Context: [The question, and why now] Options considered: 1. [Option] — [why rejected / chosen] 2. [Option] — [why rejected / chosen] Reasoning: [The 2–3 reasons that decided it] Decided by: [Owner] Agreed by: [Names] Disagreed: [Names, and their concern] Status: Decided | Superseded by DEC-[n] | Reversed Revisit: [Date or condition, or "no"] Links: [Docs, tickets, recording]
A filled-in example
ID: DEC-042 Date: 2026-09-18 Decision: We ship Onboarding v2 this sprint, behind a flag, at 10% of new signups. Context: v2 is ready except SSO; sales asked to wait for SSO. Options considered: 1. Wait for SSO (+3 weeks) — rejected: blocks the activation experiment. 2. Ship to 100% now — rejected: support docs not ready. 3. Ship at 10% behind a flag — chosen. Reasoning: Activation data in 2 weeks; SSO customers are on the old flow anyway; flag lets us roll back in minutes. Decided by: Priya (PM) Agreed by: Sam (Eng), Dev (Design) Disagreed: none Status: Decided Revisit: When the 2-week activation data is in. Links: Launch brief p.4, ENG-231
How to keep the log alive
- Write the entry in the meeting, not after. If it waits until later, it doesn't happen.
- Read the decision back out loud before the meeting ends, and get an explicit yes from each person.
- Keep the log in one place, and link it from the tickets and docs it produced.
- Never edit an old decision. Supersede it with a new entry that links back.
- Log small decisions too. The ones that cause arguments later are rarely the big ones.
How Align does this for you
Align fills in the log for you. In an Align room, decisions land on the board as they're said, with who said them, and the recap emailed after the call lists what was decided and who does what. The room keeps every decision and recap, so the log builds itself call by call. Tasks go to Linear or Jira in one click, linked back to the call, and later you can ask Align why a decision was made and get the answer with links to its sources.
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between a decision log and meeting minutes?
Minutes record what was discussed in one meeting. A decision log records only the decisions, across all meetings, with the reasoning, so it stays short and searchable.
Where should a team keep its decision log?
Somewhere everyone already looks and can link to: a shared doc or wiki page, a database in your docs tool, or a tool that creates the records from your meetings automatically.
Is a decision log the same as an ADR?
An Architecture Decision Record is a decision log entry for a technical decision, usually stored in the code repository. The same fields work for product, business and hiring decisions.